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FROM THE PRESIDENT An excerpt from the Oct. 1999 Deseret Chapter Newsletter HUDSON SPOKEN HERE
… We can all sleep well knowing that our Hudsons are Y2K compliant. That leaves me with only one topic – excuses. I used to take relief in my belief that the progress on my ’33 was going better than X’s progress on his ’37 Terraplane. That was until X pointed out that he gets his Terraplane out of the garage every now and then and takes it for a test drive. Okay, so I’m slow, but I’ve got a lot of good excuses why I am so slow. I’m sure that most of you have heard about Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. Maslow identified a hierarchy of five levels, the lowest being the most basic human needs. According to Maslow all of the needs in a level had to be fulfilled before moving to a higher level. Maslow graphically showed his hierarchy as a triangle, with the point being at the top. Soon to be just as famous is Putman’s hierarchy of excuses. In my hierarchy the triangle is delicately balanced on one point. The lowest level, excuse number one is money – "I don’t have enough money." A lack of money is the most fundamental excuse for an auto restorer wannabe (aka want-to-be). Excuses at the higher levels can drive the wannabe back down to the basic excuse of money. At the second level of Putman’s hierarchy are excuses numbers two and three. Excuse number two is time – "I don’t have enough time." Excuse number three is skill – "I can’t do it." A solution to excuse number one is to work more hours. Working more hours may solve excuse number one but at the same time it greatly amplifies excuse number two. As for excuse number three, if the person lacks the skill, then the person must learn that skill or pay someone else to perform the task. Paying someone else to do the job drives you back to excuse number one. There are a limitless number of reasons to invoke some of the excuses making it necessary to have a complicated numbering scheme to document all of the excuses. Expansions of excuses numbers one and two include the honeydews and impacts caused by other family members (e.g. children that think money and time are plentiful). Speaking of honeydews, have you ever noticed how you carefully prioritize all of your work only to find out that your spouse has prioritized the list in a different manner and included higher priority taskings that you weren’t planning on doing? Level three includes excuses number four through six. Excuse number four is "I can’t find the part that I need." A wannabe can nurse this excuse forever and when the overly priced part is finally found the wannabe can quickly revert to excuse number one to avoid buying the part. The wannabe can again use excuse number four when the part is sold to someone else. Excuse number five is to blame it on the weather – too hot, too cold, too windy, too rainy, etc. Finally excuse number six is to blame it on someone else. I’m still working on level four. Excuse number seven is natural disasters, such as earthquakes and landslides. However, you’re welcome to challenge a Deseret Chapter member using concerns of aftershocks from the Turkey earthquake as a reason not to work on his car in Utah. Excuse number eight is other disasters, such as "I’ve been drafted to fight in the intergalactic war". This idea of documenting the excuse tree dawned on me this morning as I once again came up with another excuse for not painting my Terraplane. Earlier the spring I used excuse #2-197 spring-cleaning, then excuse #5-3 "It’s raining". From here I came up with excuse #2-1014 – "I need to finish the addition to the sprinkling system" as well as excuse #2-1015 – "I need to put the bricks back on the house". This brings me to today. The frame of my Terraplane is sandblasted; I have the primer, the painter’s mask… everything I need to paint the frame. This was when I decided to exercise excuse #6-129 – "There’s too much dirt in the air to get good results". Of course I’ll probably be able to nurse this excuse for a long time. In a quick review, the excuse hierarchy appears as,
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